So with our women-folk out on a "Horse Event" for the day, Layton and I had to think fast and improvise.

We elected to climb a mesa that we had been talking about in the Jemez Mountains. This would allow us to have a great February day in the sun, scope some cliff bands that I had been wondering about, and hunt for some evidence of ruins on top that I had heard rumors of.


Layton is about as fun a hiking pard as a guy could hope for, always ready for the next move, starting with the stream crossing.



The geology of the Jemez is really pretty amazing with formations of Sandstone, Granite, Volcanic Tuff and Basalt. But I honestly wasn't aware of the amount of limestone we were to traverse on this hike.
Ancient Oceans....


The place was thicker with bazilliondy year old clams and sea fossils than I've ever seen!!




Of course it wasn't long before the eating machine wanted a snack, but the old man never could outfit a feedbag like his mother.





As we worked our way up the drainage, Layton wondered out loud if we'd ever get to the cliffs I was telling him we would explore. "These little hills in New Mexico are always bigger than you expect" I muttered.



The distractions were aplenty though.....


Like, how many fossils and imprints can you find in this photo?



The scenery improved as we inched our way upward.



Past the local choss quarry.....



Volcanic at last!!



Ahhh, these are the crags I came to look at!







The nice cracks were something I had spotted from a distance. But there were also things I didn't expect. Look close at that bottom right corner:



And this!!


The more rock we looked at, the more images we found.



As we traversed, they grew in frequency and quality too....


So many cool formations.




Then,.......Whoa.......




Believe it or not, that "thing" was way higher than we could even reach.








There were so many panels and images that they overlapped each other. I can't even put up all the pictures I took. Unless you yell enough....


There were a lot of fun rocks to look at also!



I'll be back in a minute, but I'm gonna post this in the interest of someone seeing it tonight. I can post a lot more petroglyphs if you're interested.